Ask HN: Best developer notebook in 2015?
So, been a while since I last saw a post discussing notebooks here in HN. What is the best notebook for developers in your opinion and why? From ultrabooks to desktop replacements, every vote is valid.
I got a deal through a third party apple reseller and still paid around $2300. This was late 2012 and I am still typing on it today with no desire to upgrade. 3 years on one machine is an eternity from me.
I got the 512 SSD so I could run multiple OS's and not worry about still having room for any media I might want. I still have ~80gb free with all my mp3's and VM's. 16GB of ram and a retina display as well.
I get the "apple hate". I really do. I have 3 laptops total in my life (Chromebook Pixel and Debian HP Stream 11 which serve very different purposes) and I still feel that the OSX is the best Unix based operating system for productivity in my market (startup/web development).
Maybe when Linux display tools wrap their head around high dpi displays, my opinion will change (Chromebook Pixel handles it very well so it must be coming!) but I really urge anyone who says "I personally will not buy anything from Apple" to reconsider why they're saying that.
Even Microsoft is making some pretty awesome choices these days, so I for one would never rule out the possibility of someone woo-ing me.
..a brief aside on the price... if I bought this for $2300 in December 2012, then I used it for all of 2013, 2014 and 5 months in 2015. 29 months of use. That's $79 a month invested in the thing I MAKE MY LIVING with. The price is only bad if you compare it to other "comparable" laptops. If you can get 3 years out of a $1,000 laptop without it slowing down your work, then props to you. I personally never could do that (even with other apple devices. Just try and think about the big picture when you purchase your dev machine, whatever make/model it could be :)
I agree 100%. For years I used Linux for almost everything, but I always kept Windows installed on a separate partition for the handful of Windows-only programs I needed as part of my job. (Photoshop being the most notable.) A coworker finally convinced me to make the switch to a MacBook Pro, and I haven't looked back: Apple bashing aside, the truth of the matter is my MBP runs well, runs consistently, and supports all the tools I need as a software engineer.
And regarding your point on price: I have a two year old ThinkPad (they were literally giving them away where I work) that I finally gave up and installed Linux on because of its poor performance. Compare that to my early-2011 MacBook Pro, which I still use for day to day web browsing, web development and light Photoshop work, and the long term cost benefits of a MBP become apparent.
New one has been working just fine for the past 1 year. I've stuck more RAM in the machine over the past 2 years, but I really want a UHD+ display now, however I can't find anything which fits my needs :(
So I think I'm going to stick to my MBP 2011 for now.
Mine is 3 years old, and the 8-core (ht) i7 with 16GB of ram has never let me down, plus the graphics are fantastic. Battery life is about what you'd expect from a non ultra-light (4-6 hours out of the box).
I make my living providing web application development services, and have had to make some changes to my workflow.
- My online video meeting solution was not a SaaS application, and was replaced.
- Google Docs works, but it's not as flexible as Microsoft Word for me. But Word online did not seem appealing, so it's Google Docs here. Key company documents have been put there to act as templates.
- Lastly, I need a decent internet connection to get anything done.
Other than that, everything remains much the same. But take me offline and there is little I can do. On a recent international trip I had to plan what I took on the plane to be productive carefully as I could not guarantee there would be a decent internet for the chromebook to connect to.
My corporate IT infrastructure is in an AWS Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), fronted with a VPN server. Internal corporate applications run on a private subnet on the VPC. I do miss the Retina display from the Macbook Pro I used to have before, but not as much as I expected. Lastly the wife retains a beefy iMac as she is the lead designer. I can borrow if it becomes necessary. So I'm running with a safety net. Since we are making a living off this infrastructure for our small development shop I wanted to have a fallback available.
This setup has been on a trial run for three months so far. While some changes had to be made in my workflow, to date I am as productive as I was before. Currently I predict continued success. There is very little left to test, and I am running the team as before while contributing live production code.
- Create an Amazon seller account in which you have absolutely stellar reviews and customer service. A perfect five stars is what you are aiming for, which is pretty easy to accomplish if you try (e.g. with roughly 50 sales over the years, I only have one 4 star review and all others are 5 stars).
- Purchase the Mac product(s) you want.
- Ensure you keep good care of the laptops and also keep the original boxes and accessories.
- When Apple comes out with a new version, immediately buy the new version(s).
- Sell your old version(s) via your Amazon seller account.
You will find certain product lines hold their resale value better. For instance, iPads, 13-inch rMBP, and both Airs hold their value well. On the other hand, iMacs and Mac Pros don't hold their value very well. In the middle you have iPhones, 15-inch rMBPs, and Minis. Customized add-ons (in which you can't go into a store and buy) are a huge no-no with this approach. The depreciation cost is just too high.
Honestly I think most modern laptops are more than powerful enough for development work. The only thing that matters to me is keyboard, because unless you are buying a cheap budget laptop it will have more than enough power for whatever you want. And when it comes to keyboard I just use an external keyboard anyway so whatever it is plugged into is fine for me.
The only reason I absolutely must have a Mac is for running X Code and building ios apps, because I'm not going to be running a hackintosh for that.
may I know why? Currently running Hackintosh and it's been fine. I am doing Stanford's Course and so far it's been fine. My laptop is pretty old, now I am thinking to whether to get a MBP or go hackintosh way.
It seems many of them have problems as diverse as mice and keyboards not working properly, to fans not running as expected. I haven't done it personally so admittedly I'm not the best to speak on this matter. I can only repeat what I've heard from my coworkers about their experience. Fundamentally I'm not a fan of fiddling with configuration to get my computer to work, and would rather just use something that works great out of the box as a tool so I can focus on fiddling with code instead.
- It was refurbished, so it cost ~20% less
- Incredible hardware
- OSX is Unix that just works -- as opposed to having to fiddle with installing a distro and finding good drivers
- iOS development is a huge market
- OSX has awesome apps. Some of my favorites: Subtitles, Adapter, Alfred, Keynote
There are very few things a modern laptop would bring me that this one doesn't.
At home I have a much more capable development desktop, and at work an even better (i7 4790) computer. But the thing is, apart from the lower power consumption (from 20W-30W regular usage down to 10-20W, depending on the configuration), there's no point in upgrading for me.
I'm still a student, so I'm still playing occasionally with things like OpenGl shaders, game programming, machine learning, and other orthogonal areas of computer science, for that I use my desktop. I don't think a laptop is that great for working (sub-optimal posture).
But sure, there are people who need bigger screens/ more horsepower (high-performance computing/ those coding in memory hogging environments).
But for Linux, and low-level programming, a slightly older machine definitely suffices.
Granted, I live in a part of the world where one can live reasonably for a few months-up to a whole year for the price of a rMbp, and I value financial independence, freedom, more than the status signaling ability a Mbp could bring, but I do see why others might value it more.
- 16 GB RAM
- Intel Iris
- Core i5/i7
- 13" - 15"
- Under 3 pounds
- UHD+ Screen
Here's everything that comes close, though all of them one common pitfall, RAM is limited to 8 GB
UX301LA
Thinkpad X1 Carbon ( No Iris as well )
The ones that don't make the grade :
Macbook Pro 13" - Didn't like the keyboard, little to no keytravel
It's cheap, pretty high resolution, thin, light, good battery life, and no touch screen. (an important one for me.)
All of my laptops have Java 8, IntelliJ, lein (for Clojure and Clojurescript), git, ssh, Chrome, Ruby, and Python installed.
I mostly write my books using markdown and a text editor.
It doesn't really matter which of my laptops I am using. Living in IntelliJ and Chrome makes OS choice not so important.
Edit: I just used the HP Stream 11 exclusively while travelling, and Windows 8.1 is working well for me. I am thinking of switching to a Surface 3 because I like the form factor. One requirement: all of my laptops can connect to a large monitor on the desk in my home office.
Great windows laptop for me